Sep. 29, 2013
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The POW MIA flag. / Getty Images

by Rob Johnson, Pensacola (Fla.) News Journal

by Rob Johnson, Pensacola (Fla.) News Journal

PENSACOLA, Fla. -- Readjusting to life in the family and community may have been easier for some American prisoners of war in Vietnam than it is today for young warriors returning home from combat deployments.

Advantages, large and small, that POWs say they had include everything from the bonding that many of the roughly 600 men held captive in North Vietnam experienced with one another, to welcoming messages crocheted by military nurses and, in one instance, a friendly pastor who dropped by to share martinis with a downed pilot upon his return.

"We came back appreciating America and everything we had lost in prison," said Ronald Webb, a retired Air Force colonel who spent six years in North Vietnamese prisons.

After a lengthy period of solitary confinement, Webb called the rejuvenating brotherhood that arose when POWs were allowed to share cells.

"When we regained human contact, the cell became a psychologists' laboratory," he said. "We did everything together: choirs, toastmasters' clubs and classes."

News Journal interviews with several former POWs who live in the Pensacola area reveal some commonalities they say helped them reclaim their lives. The interviews took place shortly before and after the nation's annual POW/MIA Recognition Day on Sept. 20.

Although the 591 POWs released by North Vietnam in 1973 encountered many challenges, their overall transition back to life at home was relatively successful. To be sure, there were suicides and many divorces, but the Pensacola POWs say they feel worse for today's veterans of the global war on terrorism returning from Afghanistan and Iraq.

"They're coming back from the fight. We lost people. My bombardier was killed when we were shot down," said retired Navy Capt. Allen Brady, now 84. "But most of us who were prisoners had been in airplanes. We didn't shoot a guy and watch him drop dead, or see a buddy get his head blown off."

Thus the current tensions endured by deployed ground troops are more tormenting than those experienced by air crews over North Vietnam, Brady said.

"On our missions, people would shoot at you," he said. "But I'd rather have that than drive down a road and worry about hidden bombs that might go off at any time right beside you."

Reclaiming normalcy and happiness after coming home is proving difficult for many young veterans, with high rates of post traumatic stress disorder and suicides among active-duty members and veterans.

Here are some of the memories of Vietnam POWs retired in Pensacola that underscore differences in their personal makeup and the American culture of their times that set them apart from many of today's combat veterans.

Camaraderie

"I had friendships throughout my career, but the ones I made there share something unique," said Howard Hill, a retired Air Force colonel who was imprisoned from 1967 to 1973. "Adversity sometimes makes people who are faced with the same situation come together."

Even the pressure, sometimes including torture, to betray their country with strategic information or public statements acknowledging that America's involvement in Vietnam was unjust, served to strengthen the POWs' resolve.

"We had training ahead of time on resisting that kind of thing and extensive lessons on the code of military conduct," a sort of ethical guide, said Tom Pyle, a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel and electronic warfare officer who was shot down in an F-105 Thunderchief.

"All that forms a backbone," Pyle said. "Everyone knows what they're expected to live up to."

Webb speculated that the human contact became more precious amid the pangs of loneliness.

"We had a camaraderie I'm not sure is as common in today's military," he said. "The young people spend so much time on the Internet. We didn't have texting, and we felt fortunate when we were allowed to talk with each other.

"I think we were closer."

Maturity

Pyle said the average age among his cellmates was 35.

"We were mostly college graduates, older and a little more mature than a lot of the troops in Afghanistan," Pyle said. "Many of us had been in multiple units already and had served elsewhere overseas. That helped us cope."

Webb's variety of work experience before joining the Air Force gave him important perspective, he said.

"I had worked as a laborer, taught grade school and taught English in high school," he said.

All that gave him a view of the world that tempered his approach to military service and broadened his outlook on the possibilities awaiting him back home.

Brady said: "I don't want to say we were elite or anything but we were flight officers, bombardiers and pilots. We had gone through a battery of tests to make sure we were psychologically viable."

He added, "I had graduated from the Naval Academy. That's going to be a lot different than a young corporal who doesn't have the benefit of a background with traditions and standards. We had been trained that we had something to live up to, and that had become part of us."

Family

Hill, the retired Air Force colonel, said the durability of marriage to his wife of 47 years, Libby, was crucial to his return in 1973.

Now 70, Hill recalled suffering what he views as a form of post traumatic stress disorder.

"I was in a manic state when I got back, going on three or four hours sleep a night â?? watching TV and writing to friends at the same time," he said. "It got to be too much."

He considers it fortunate that the couple didn't yet have children. And Libby was patient with his readjustment. "We had to get to know each other again."

Libby, who by the time Hill returned was in her early 30s, had experience with the military's politics, working as a volunteer for Department of Defense on behalf of POWs and as a founding member of the National League of Families. Her wherewithal led the couple to discreetly seek counseling in a special Navy program for POWs at Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland.

"As far as I know, they didn't tell the Air Force about it," Hill said.

The counseling clicked for the Hills, and Libby's gentle savvy worked to bolster their marriage. The couple thrived while Hill went back to flying for the Air Force. They have three children and a granddaughter, who was born last July.

Hill credits his family's success in part to the help he got in understanding what Libby had been through while he was a prisoner.

"It was much harder on the families in some ways," Hill said. "Being a prisoner was open-ended, and we didn't know how long we would be held. Meanwhile, the families didn't know exactly what was happening to us. But at least we knew."

The little things

Personal acts of kindness can be more important to a military member's readjustment than multimillion-dollar programs. Brady recalled the gesture of a nurse at the Naval Medical Center in Portsmouth, Va., soon after his return from Vietnam in 1973.

"She crocheted this little sign that said, 'Today is the first day of the rest of your life,' and gave it to me in a frame," he said. "I think that had a big impact on me."

About that time, while stationed in Virginia Beach, Brady, who said he "really isn't religious," received some home visits from a local pastor.

"He was just a good guy who took a liking to me and would come by, give me some guidance and drink a martini," Brady said.

Brady remembers the pastor's congeniality as a steadying complement to the soothing martinis.